The present invention relates to an apparatus for winding magnetic tape and leader tape onto hubs. A conventional cassette tape fabrication is made in the way that as shown in FIG. 13, a long wound magnetic tape 6 is wound onto a pair of hubs 9 to a predetermined length, which is put in a cassette case. The pair of hubs having the magnetic tape wound thereon to the predetermined length is called the spectacles herein.
In fabricating the spectacles, the magnetic tape 6 may be damaged when the magnetic tape 6 is directly wound onto the hubs 9.
To avoid this, leader tape 3 is wound onto the innermost and outermost turns to protect the magnetic tape 6. For the reason, fabrication of the spectacles has to be made according to the following steps. Each of the hubs is clamped onto one end of the leader tape of a predetermined length by a clamping arrangement. The hubs are moved to and put on a winding arrangement by hand or a belt conveyor or the like. The leader tape clamped onto the hubs by the winding arrangement is then cut. The magnetic tape is spliced to one of the cut ends. The hub having the magnetic tape spliced thereto is turned to wind the magnetic tape thereon to a predetermined length. Then, the magnetic tape is cut. The magnetic tape is spliced to the other end of the leader tape. This completes the spectacles. The fabrication of the spectacles, as described above, needs two different arrangements for the clamping step and the winding step.
Also, the spectacles can be fabricated in another, similar method of two steps. In the first step, a long magnetic tape is prespliced with predetermined lengths of leader tape at certain intervals to produce a magnetic tape with leader tape segments.
In the second step, the magnetic tape with the leader tape segments is supplied and cut at the leader tape segments. One end of the cut leader tape segment is clamped onto a first hub. The clamped hub is revolved to start winding the magnetic tape and the leader tape. Then, the next leader tape segment is cut. The cut end is clamped onto a second hub. This completes the spectacles. This fabrication method also needs two different arrangements in the first and second steps.
Either of these two conventional methods for fabricating the spectacles described above has to use two arrangements. The use of the two arrangements involves the problem that it not only takes some time to move in-fabrication parts between the two arrangements, but also has to use man power or a different arrangement for the moving step. This raises the production cost.
Also, in fabricating the magnetic tape with leader tape segments, various kinds of tape have to be produced. This involves the problem that control is complicated in winding the tape onto the hubs.
In order to solve the problems described above, the Japanese Patent Application Hei 2-416148 discloses an apparatus. This apparatus comprises a clamping arrangement for clamping a hub onto each end of a leader tape of a predetermined length, a winding arrangement for winding magnetic tape onto the hub clamped to the leader tape, and a moving arrangement for holding the outside of the hub clamped onto the leader tape and moving it from the clamping arrangement to the winding arrangement. This single unit of apparatus can fabricate the spectacles having the leader tape and the magnetic tape wound thereon.
However, the preceding apparatus has the disadvantage that it is complicated in its construction and takes a long production time as it includes the conventional arrangements for the fabrication steps. That is, in fabricating the spectacles with the preceding apparatus, a pair of hubs having the leader tape clamped with the clamping arrangement is made once. It is moved to the winding arrangement by the moving arrangement. The leader tape and the magnetic tape are cut and spliced together. The magnetic tape then is wound.